Market research is a very important component of business strategy, which provides important information to identify and analyze the market need, market size and competition. All successful owners must know their markets, competitors, customer wants and needs, and what it takes to be competitive. You should expect to budget at least a minimum amount of time and money for research, especially if you are starting a new business or branching out into a new direction.
Determine Your Research Needs and Objectives
The first step in doing market research is to decide what you really need to find out. The kind of information you are seeking should determine the type of research you will do, although of course budgetary constraints will play a part in your decision.
You may wish to conduct blind tests of different formulas before finalizing recipes for a new product. In that case, you can do “laboratory” tests, where brands, packages and names of products are not revealed to the test subjects and achieve statistically reliable results at the 90% to 95% confidence level of predictability. Or perhaps you have completes extensive product development and testing and are now ready for a field test of your prototype products.
Conceptually, market research breaks down into the following categories:
(1)Primary research—involves the actual data-gathering about the specific usage patterns, product feature likes and dislikes, etc., of target buyers or current users of your products.
(2)Secondary research—with this type of research, some else has done the actual data-gathering in the field and has written it up in a form that’s easier for you yo use. Secondary research is generally much less time-consuming and cheaper than primary research.
Qualitative and Quantitative Research
Qualitative research is primarily concerned with getting a subjective “feel” for the research topic, not a numerical, statistically predictable measure. Traditionally, qualitative research consists of focus groups and individual interviews. Focus groups can be thought of as “group interviews”, where a manageable number of target buyers are brought together, presented with an idea or a prototype product, and asked to discuss their opinions with a moderator and with each other.
Quantitative research is distinguished from quantitative research primarily by the large numbers of people who are questioned and the type of questioned asked. Quantitative questionnaires usually gather information that can be numerically tabulated.
Contact Us
If you have further inquires, please do not hesitate to contact Tannet at anytime, anywhere by simply visiting Tannet’s website english.tannet-group.com, or calling Hong Kong hotline at 852-27826888 or China hotline at 86-755-82143422, or emailing to tannet-solution@hotmail.com. You are also welcome to visit our office situated in 16/F, Taiyangdao Bldg 2020,Dongmen Rd South, Luohu , Shenzhen, China.
Previous：Marketing Management
Next：Channel Financing